The convulsions of the twentieth century can be traced through the trajectory of individual lives scattered across the globe. In Bernhard Schlink’s The Granddaughter and Claire Messud’s This Strange Eventful History, the repercussions of the schisms of the Berlin Wall and Algerian Revolution are felt generations later as far away as Australia. How do characters reconcile with their families’ hidden histories? How do they unearth long-buried secrets and what does it mean to reconcile with a past that feels both distant and immediate? Join Bernhard Schlink, Claire Messud, and moderator Sam Sacks of the Wall Street Journal, for a captivating conversation exploring how fiction illuminates the long shadows of history.
